Roger and Stephen in Singapore: Halong Bay day trip

We hired a tour guide who came with a driver to take us to Halong Bay from our hotel in Hanoi. The trip by car takes about 3.5 hours with a stop at a tourist souvenir centre for about 20 minutes which stocked the same items that are available in the markets and shops in Hanoi. The car ride certainly was an experience with constant lane changing (often on the wrong side of the road ) as we passed through many small villages and rice fields. Some of the cargo being carried on the back of motorbikes had to be seen to believed and the the most astonishing item was a washing machine being transported!

Arriving at Halong Bay the number of boats available to take passengers on a cruise is incredible and despite the large numbers of tourists we boarded our boat efficiently with 8 other tourists.

A seafood lunch was served on the boat while we headed out to the Bay and I was a bit concerned that the amount of boats would spoil the experience. But due to the vast size of the bay it was certainly peaceful as we motored around the countless limestone pillars and islands.

The weather was perfect and our tour guide told us that it is such a gamble with the weather and often after arriving the boat rides are cancelled due to the bad weather. Certain tours stop off at the many floating villages along the way but we instead stopped of at a huge caves called "Hung Dau Go" ( Cave of Wooden Stakes ) which gets its name from where the Vietnamese use to store sharpened wooden stakes to fight of the Mongolians in the 13 century.

The caves are reached by climbing 90 steps and once inside there are 3 chambers with many stalactites and stalagmites which our guide had much fun pointing out various formations that looked like certain objects. Some were easily seen but others required a vivid imagination!